Under The Weeping Willow
by Transgenic-girl
Summary: A perfect moment under the weeping willow in the Royal Gardens. One-shot fluff. Jeb/Az centric, mention of Cain/DG


Sunlight filtered through the branches overhead, the leaves of the weeping willow whispered in the slight breeze swirling around the pair lounging in the shade. Two figures, male and female, comfortable in each other's embrace, enjoying the mild weather and a rare space of time during the day where there were no demands on either of their time. Where they were free to do as they wished.

The man's blue eyes were on the sleeping form of his love, his expression soft. One of his arms was around her waist, as her head was on his chest, one hand on his opposite shoulder, one at the back of his neck. His free hand was buried in her dark tresses, the barely there wind picking up strands of her long hair, his fingers smoothing their way through the cascading waves of the mass.

She had once laughingly accused him of being obsessed with her hair, of having a hair fetish. He spent so much time with his hands entwined in the dark brown locks, and if he was not combing through it with his surprisingly agile fingers, he was either pushing a wayward curl behind her ear, or tracing the feel of her skull beneath the heavy weight of her hair.

He had retorted that if he had a hair fetish, what did she have? Often he had woken to find her watching him sleep, her eyes on his face as if she was trying to burn his image into her brain where it could never be worn away. And at least one of her hands would be at the nape of his neck, a finger winding through a blonde curl there.

Before her he had not been someone who was overly into touching, in fact he had disliked being touched for the most part. It made it too difficult to keep one's guard up for enemy ambushes if someone was always brushing against you. Clouded the senses. But she was so tactile, wanting to absorb every sensation around her after being so long deprived of her own will. Her own ability to touch, taste, smell, feel what she wished.

She seemed to absorb everything her senses could with an intensity that still astonished him. Like one of those flakey sugar pastries she adored, which he always knew when she had had one because she would have at least one crumb that escaped notice, and he would pick it up and raise one eyebrow to make her laugh. Or the way she would kiss him sometimes as if she could just literally melt into him, kisses that truly threatened to buckle his knees. Or even the way her eyes would dance when she played with her puppy, a bumbling ball of fur and tongue that would grow into a guard dog, how she would throw her head back and laugh at the antics of the dog.

But what he really loved most was the fact that her tactile nature extended to touching him whenever she could. Not just sexually, although he far from minded that, but the innocent and chaste touches as well. Sliding her fingers over the lines of his face when she looked at him in a quiet moment, grabbing onto his arm when she bounced in excitement over something, the way she would brush a kiss over his mouth or cheek whenever she said 'hello,' or 'goodbye,' or even 'I'm hungry let's get something to eat.'

They always seemed to greet each other as if they had been separated for a lifetime. Even under the most formal of circumstances, when all they could do was share a heated glance and she would slip her hand into his. Although she did love to push the boundaries, even when her parents were a few steps away, she would often lean in close to whisper naughty suggestions into his ear to make him blush. She dearly seemed to love making his cheeks go red in the middle of a state dinner, then turning to the side to share polite conversation with some dignitary or another.

His intense inspection of the picture she made was broken by the soft clearing of someone's throat. Blue eyes raised, to meet another set of the same blue. His father smiled, even as his step-mother bounded up behind him to hook her arm into the crook of his elbow. She was grinning widely at the pair beneath the weeping willow, and looked as if she was going to say something, before her husband put a finger to his lips and gave her a mock stern glance. Her eyes rolled, not exactly Queenly behavior.

The man beneath the tree smiled in return, still reluctant to wake his own wife, even though he could see that the suns were going down. And soon the cool air would become uncomfortably cold. It took some delicate maneuvering but he was able to slip out from beneath the grasp of the woman he loved, and scooped her up into his arms as he stood.

"Jebby?" She mumbled out, still mostly asleep, eyes barely cracking open to allow him a glimpse of melted chocolate color.

"It's okay Azzy, just taking you inside," he assured her, brushing a loose strand of hair out of her face with his thumb.

A soft sigh, "Okay," and she fell back into her dream world, her hand moving unconsciously to the slight curve of her stomach. It was a familiar move of hers in the last few weeks since Raw delivered the joyous news, one that made him beam with happiness whenever he saw it.

The man looked over at his widely smiling father, at the equally toothy grin of DG's, and he realized that this was one of those perfect moments in life. Rare but worth many times its weight in gold. Pulling his wife tighter against his chest, he led the way back into the Palace.


End file.
